Beloved, I exhort [you], as strangers and sojourners, to abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul;
Peter calls his readers sojourners and exiles — "strangers and pilgrims" in older translations. He then warns them of a danger that works from the inside, and tells them what to do about it.
The letter changes gear here. Privilege gives way to appeal:
After this (1 Peter 2:11), the apostle begins his exhortations. Whatever privileges the Christian may have in his position, he is always seen as a pilgrim on the earth. And, as we have seen, the constant government of God is what fills the apostle's mind. But he warns them first about what is inward. He warns them about the sources from which corruptions spring. Under that government, those corruptions would dishonour the name of God and even bring in judgment.
A believer can be a stranger for two opposite reasons:
In the first verse of the letter the apostle calls the believing Jews strangers. They are outcasts from the land of Israel, scattered among the Gentiles. Here they are strangers and pilgrims along with all believers, because they belong to heaven. In the one case they are strangers because the judgment of God had driven them out of their earthly inheritance. In the other, they are strangers because the grace of God had called them from earth to heaven.
The two words are not a repetition. Each points a different direction:
"Strangers" connects with what is around; "pilgrims" with what is before. A stranger is one who shows that he does not belong to the place where he happens to be. A pilgrim shows that he is journeying on to what lies ahead of him. He has no desire to settle down until he reaches that place. Israel were strangers in Egypt; pilgrims in the wilderness.
Being away from home is not the same as having no home:
A fugitive is a man who has fled from home. A vagabond is a man who has no home. A stranger is a man who is absent from home. A pilgrim is a man who is on his way home.
Notice who does the fighting here. The passions wage the war; Peter asks for something else:
He does not say, "War against the passions of the flesh." He says, "Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul" (1 Peter 2:11). If we abstain, there is no warfare. If we do not, the enemy stirs these passions up powerfully, and they war against us. They entangle us with the very things that hinder our march on toward the possession of our inheritance.
The same writer points this outward:
The flesh in the believer wars against the spiritual progress of the soul. So we are told to abstain from the passions of the flesh, not to war against them. It is hardly our business to fight drink or impurity or other evils in the world. Our part is to show the excellencies of Him who has called us out of darkness into light.
The danger rarely announces itself. It often arrives dressed as something warm and good:
How often, through lack of prayer and watchfulness, fleshly lusts spring out of sincere respect and pure affection! The affection slides into something sensual before anyone notices... How easily little fond familiarities follow, step by step, as the closeness of Christian love ripens into unholy freedom, if not into the worst evil. Lust may take another direction and form, such as greed or any other indulgence foreign to Christ. Men praise many of these fleshly desires as doing well for self, but they war against the soul and are detestable in God's sight.
The casualties here are inward, and often small enough to overlook:
"Abstain from the passions of the flesh," says the apostle. Peter is talking about the inner life of the soul, about those thousand and one little things that come in to spoil communion with God, and to hinder growth and the knowledge of Christ.
Abstaining is not a matter of willpower. It follows from where the heart already lives:
If our heart is where He is, if our affections are set on things above, if we lose sight of the "vain things" that charm the natural man, if we grasp by faith the heavenly calling and the heavenly home — then we shall not fight the lusts of the flesh. We shall abstain from them gladly and willingly, and flee them, as Paul urged Timothy.
- Beloved — Peter appeals; he does not command. He turns here from what believers are to how they walk.
- Stranger — grace made you foreign here, not misfortune. A stranger is absent from home, not without one.
- Pilgrim — the same grace gave you a destination, so you look ahead instead of settling down.
- Abstain — the passions do the warring; your part is to hold off. Decline the fight and there is no war.
- Soul — these small things spoil communion with God and hinder growth and the knowledge of Christ. A heart set above them abstains gladly.
having your conversation honest among the Gentiles, that [as to that] in which they speak against you as evildoers, they may through [your] good works, [themselves] witnessing [them], glorify God in [the] day of visitation.
Peter has warned his readers about the wrong desires inside them; now he points to the watching world outside. Three questions follow: what life Peter asks for, why the slander comes, and what the "day of visitation" means.
Hamilton Smith ties this to the warning just before it, and shows what good conduct is for.
Having warned us against sinful desires within, the Apostle now urges us about our outward conduct before the world. We are to be careful to act with complete honesty, so that our good works prove false the hard words that call us evildoers.
ESV says "honorable" where older translations say "honest." The word covers more than being trustworthy.
In the New Testament these words are not limited to trustworthiness, the way we commonly use them today. They extend to any honourable conduct.
Kelly names both the source of this conduct and the aim behind it.
So the call is to have their behaviour attractive (Greek kalen) among the Gentiles... The spring of this conduct is the faith that looks to the Father and calls on Him. But it is also a duty to win over the unbelieving and hostile by living in a way that matches Christ, giving no opening to those who are looking for one. People of the world suspect the motives and the ways of the faithful. Yet they have a strong, if not well-informed, sense of their responsibilities, and they are always on the watch for them to stumble and fail.
The slander had a shape. Critics looked at Christian meetings and noticed what was missing.
It was an early and common accusation among the Gentiles that Christians must be atheists, because they turned from idols. In their meeting places you saw no image of gold, silver, stone, or wood, and no picture made by human hands. The Jews knew perfectly well that this was only because the living and true God had won these believers away from such empty things, to serve Him.
Darby points to the real target behind the attacks.
Christians bore the name of God. People's minds were hostile to His name. They tried to disgrace it by blaming Christians for the evil conduct they themselves practised without remorse. At the same time they complained (1 Peter 4:4) that Christians would not join them in the same excess and disorder. The Christian had only to follow the path of faithfulness to God.
Commentators differ over what this day is. Some read it as God visiting in grace, when trouble drives people to look for help.
Does this mean a visitation in judgment, or the visitation in grace? It means the second, though a visit by the chastening hand of God is not ruled out. When sorrows come, when hopes on earth collapse, when sickness makes it impossible to enjoy material things, unbelievers often turn to the people of God for help and comfort. God's grace then shows itself in the day of visitation, and this glorifies God.
Others read it another way, starting from how Scripture uses the phrase elsewhere.
It is a mark of Scripture that you can only find the meaning of a phrase from its context... For example, the words in Luke 19:44, "the time of your visitation," clearly mean the day of grace for Jerusalem through the presence and testimony of our blessed Lord... But when we come to Peter's words, "the day of visitation," the thought is judgment rather than grace — whatever effects, gracious or otherwise, the "visitation" has on the people who go through it. We take it that this is not about one particular time or day. It is any time when God steps in and shows His power openly before the eyes of men, forcing them, in one way or another, to glorify Him and to prove His people right.
Both readings end in the same place. The accusers themselves finish by speaking for God.
In the day when God visits men, these slanderers will have their will broken and their pride subdued by God's visitation. They will be brought to confess that God had acted in these Christians, and that He had been present among them. What brings them to it is the good works which, despite their slanders, had always reached their consciences.
- Watched. People of the world suspect the motives of believers. They watch for them to slip.
- Beautiful. ESV's "honorable" means more than trustworthy. It covers any conduct that looks attractive.
- Slandered. Expect the charge of being an evildoer. Critics often pin their own conduct on the people of God.
- Silenced. The reply to hard words is not argument but good works, which contradict the accusation.
- Glorified. When God visits, the accusers confess He was at work in the people they attacked. Commentators differ on whether that visit is grace or judgment.